Reality check

Let’s talk, for a moment, about this horrible trend of fake lesbian bloggers. Both the authors of A Gay Girl in Damascus and Lez Get Real were revealed as frauds when, after amassing followings and support, they confessed to being married straight white men. They even flirted a little with each other as fake lesbian bloggers, which is the most and only funny part of these stories. Because what they did represents an insane breach of trust. Sure, you can’t believe everything you read on the internet. You can’t even believe half of it. But you expect that people who dedicate themselves to writing about important issues of equality and justice come from, at every least, a place of truth. Now, these two men could care very deeply about LGBT rights. They could, in fact, be great advocates. But they can’t do that while lying to their readerships. And what they did hurts us all. It makes people wonder, is it all fake?

Well, no, it’s not. I want to go on record and say, again, that I am not a straight white married man. I am not a man. I am not straight. I am not married. I am not any combination of the three. I am a gay gal who loves to write about pop culture and has done so online since 2006. The fact that married straight white dudes want to masquerade online as lesbian bloggers boggles my mind beyond comprehension. I really don’t understand why they bother. This isn’t a road to riches or any kind of quantifiable fame. It’s hard work that takes day-in-day-out commitment. Did they think this would be a way to somehow hook up with lesbians? Did they want to fantasize about being a gay woman? Did they just want to find better recipes for homemade hummus? I have no idea. But it makes me sad.

I write online because I love it. Writing, engaging, finding people who obsess about TV as much as I do. And I don’t reveal my “secret identify,” such as it is, for a number of reasons. I was always a shy child, and continue as an adult to fight persistent flashes of the tendency. That’s made me a private and cautious person. I seem to have missed the internet exhibitionist gene that afflicts so many these days. I also believe that writing is, ultimately, about the words. Without a face to put to them, it’s only about ideas and thoughts. So then it also becomes about trust. Do you trust the person on the other end of a glowing screen? I hope you do. I hope in the more than five years I’ve been banging away at a keyboard you’ve come to understand a little something about little old me. I don’t think you need to know what a person looks like to know what’s in their heart or mind (in my case: tank tops, girls in suits and a life-sized cut-out of Tina Fey). So today what I’d really like to do is thank you. Thank you for trusting me enough to come back, day-after-day, and to share this little corner of the Internet together where we can talk about high art and low art and really smart girls. I never take it for granted.

p.s. Yep, that’s really me in the picture. Well, at least my lips and terrible cuticles.